>>25175062
>be this phenotype
>found the largest empire in history in you're way
heh, nothing personnel kid

>>25175081
The empire was a mistake. Britain should be:
- Population capped 5 mil
- Ultra xenophobic, self sufficient North Korea mode nuclear armed state
- Screen use restricted only to watching football, cricket, darts, and rugby union
- Merry

File: 54ea4cc64977073df7b21bd7423c93bd.jpg (1016.9 KB)

1016.9 KB JPG

>>25175062
Dipped my toes into writing a combat scene, call out any dogshit prose or stylistic choices you spot please - I need feedback.

Vardun did not know how long he'd been fighting, and he in full truth did not care.

The darkspawn swarmed him without end, his greatsword and ivory armour slick with foul ichor and his lungs burning like fire, yet still he reveled in it all - the glorious, unvarnished truth of war laid before him, and it was a poor son of Forossa who did not answer its call.

He called forth a soul spear from within him, hurling it into the throat of an ogre before forming a spectral axe in his off-hand and cleaving a hurlock close to him in two. He laughed, the sound echoing and tinny within his helm. The axe shifted into a greatsword and bisected an entire swathe of the horde, before changing again into a spear that he used to pierce the skull of an emissary who'd drifted too close.

"Zwei vor gaan, Faraam!"

It tore from him, devotion and bloodlust and joy burning bright in his breast, even as the others look at him with naked fear as they beheld the full truth of what he was - what he had been born for.

A sharlock slammed into him from behind, sending him staggering a step before it shrieked in agony as an arrow sprouted from its spine. He resumed the slaughter, pushing the thought of the horror he glimpsed in his companions' eyes aside, howling his fervour back at the spawn who shrieked their own animal hate at them.

A bolt of black energy, creeping and cruel, slammed into his shoulder. He grunted, and hurled another spectral spear and snarled as it missed the emissary by a hair's breadth and instead impaled a hapless genlock to the stone. Another hurlock - larger, stronger, braver than the rest - met his steel blade head on, and Vardun felt a warriors respect that it matched him in raw might. It's clouded, blighted eyes bored into his own for a heartbeat, before they disengaged and swung again. The force raced through Vardun's arm, and a thrill ran through him at the thought of one, even monstrous as this, being his equal in might. He slammed his greathelm forward, the impact ringing in his ears and sending the beast back with a hiss, before his blade sought bite into its neck and sent it to whatever gods it worshipped. It weaved back at the last second, bringing its own greasword up in a vicious arc to drive him back. As its senses returned, it roared its challenge to him. Another howl tore from his throat, raw and fulfilled and free.

>>25175480
Why do they write in r*ddit spacing? Why not full paragraphs? I peeked at Royal Road and everything's like this. Is it for ease of reading? Is the audience so...?

>>25175490
The r*ddit spacing in my writing is unironically a carryover from my school education ("always leave a line between paragraphs for readability"). For the "full paragraphs", that's just how a lot of people write - there's only so much you actually need in a paragraph unless it's an essay or something. Hell, Conan the Barbarian - if you add in r*ddit spacing - actually looks somewhat similar if you spread it out on a computer screen.
>Is the audience so...?
Apparently most readers are female porn addicts who read books about fucking vampire CEOs or something, so yeah probably. This is mostly a personal story though because I had an itch for it - there's like two "chapters" total actually written and a bunch of random ideas I thought would be cool to write about, so I'm not massively concerned with fully consistent prose or the like.

Out of curiosity, do you have an excerpt of your own to compare mine to? Doesn't need to have anything remotely in common, I'd just like something to compare with.

>>25175511
I'm not saying it's bad, sorry if I came off bitchy-sounding. I really do not understand "sword and magic fantasy" culture. Thought, since on RR everyone writes with frequent spacing just like you here, maybe you'd have the answer for me as to why.
So no, I do not have anything of my own to show. Although I was thinking I could try my hand at it, you know, to come off my high horse, to make myself humble ("do I have any talent at all if I can't write the kind of story that would feature in a webtoon?", and such thoughts)

>>25175480
I'm not a great writer but it's alright, pretty generic. I think your names being so literal and standardfantasyslop('darkspawn') makes things feel like low effort cardboard cutouts. (I named a race in one of my projects "nords" so I'm throwing rocks in a glass house)

File: IMG_2690.jpg (3 MB)

3 MB JPG

>>25175062
If anyone is interested, I just wrote a short little nine page story about death and rebirth
https://pastebin.com/VE37qB0d

>>25175480
I don't enjoy medieval action scenes so I can't give any helpful thoughts on how engaging it is as a cohesive whole, but I can nitpick on following the moment-to-moment action
>bisected
this feels like a clinical, deliberate term that doesn't have a place in a gory hack-'n'-slash scene, clashes with the tone set by "in full truth did not care"
>before changing again into a spear that he used to pierce the skull of an emissary who'd drifted too close.
>sending him staggering a step before it shrieked in agony as an arrow sprouted from its spine
these clauses run on a little long, too many joining words in shots that should imagined as short and snappy, but I'm saying this as a slut for punctuation to join longer sentences, if they read well to you then keep them as is
>"Zwei vor gaan, Faraam!"
maybe I'm retarded but I couldn't tell who or what was saying this on my first pass-over, it might be cleared up by replacing the following "It tore from him" with "His rallying cry tore from him" or something
>A bolt of black energy, creeping and cruel, slammed into his shoulder
to me a creeping bolt would strike or puncture, it would not slam or thud
>He grunted, and hurled another spectral spear and snarled as it missed the emissary by a hair's breadth and instead impaled a hapless genlock to the stone.
the snarling here is misplaced, we're told he grunts, then snarls, and the explanation for the snarling is given two clauses later, it makes my eyes read "snarled", read ahead a bit to find out what's snarling, find out I read it correctly and it is Vardun snarling, scan over the clauses again until I reach the end, find out why he is now snarling, then forget about the intended target of the spear altogether
>matched him in raw might.
>being his equal in might.
you can cut the first mention of might, it can be implied by the warrior's respect, and described later by the thrill, have the warrior's respect described as a suspicion, then later vindicated on the second clash, something like that
>He slammed his greathelm forward,
"forward" sounds quite awkward and orthogonal, to me a greathelm would be swung in an arcing motion, unless you mean he thrusts with the top of his head as his face is craned downward, like a ram? if so then "slammed" is clashing with that motion
>Another howl tore from his throat, raw and fulfilled and free.
I like this but I think it would be cooler for this to be described as a reply to the challenge, which also ties back to the "warrior's respect" mentioned earlier, rather than making his own loud noise at nothing in particular
>devotion and bloodlust and joy
>raw and fulfilled and free.
also I don't know if there's a limit to the number of merry x and y and z constructions you can have in a combat scene, but two might be pushing it in an excerpt of this size, I think they should be used sparingly

>>25175480
better than my action scene

File: 1671138284745720.jpg (101.3 KB)

101.3 KB JPG

Forget everything you know about what makes a good essay and just write me something honest!

Accepting critiques (I know I posted this in the last Writing General but nobody responded):

He couldn’t see a thing, the dust and the smoke stymied the instruments. Blobs of nothing interspersed by the occasional signature of heat flashed white on his thermals. He had no idea what to shoot at.
“Victor 1. Fire mission. 100 meters south, four rounds into the uh...” One voice began
He swivelled the gun to look.
“Victor 1, Charlie 03. Need support! Get your guns to hit...” Another voice on a different frequency.
“Put some fucking fire on the whole god damn...” another voice joined in on the confusion
He swivelled the gun back and forth.
“..Flash, Repeat: The muzzle fla...Right there! Right there! See it? left of...” The first voice continued.
He swivelled back to look for a flash.
“Victor 1, Just fucking kill something!” House’s voice finally reached his panicked brain.
Donaldson flipped the master safety off and pressed the Fire button on his console.
The walls of every building in the cave shook as the percussion of each shot spewed fire from the barrel of the 25mm autocannon. The rounds, all travelling at 1,100 meters per second, reached their destination a fraction of a moment later. A few meters from the target, the timer in each projectile caused them to explode into precut shards, creating a cone of death that slammed with supersonic speed into what it was fired at.
Entire shacks were shredded, bodies turned into mist.
The firing paused for only a moment, the entire cave seemed to be shocked into a collective quiet awe.
“God damn! There we fucking...” Walker began to scream with his phone pointed towards the vehicle before another burst from the cannon drowned him out.
The effect on The Resistance was immediate and devastating, entire squads were killed in the short bursts, nothing they hid behind seemed to matter.

>>25175913
(Should mention that it's a military sci epic about society living in a giant cavernous Hive of cities under a fascist regime, current plans for five books)

>>25175913
>Blobs of nothing interspersed
so the void between these "blobs of nothing" is meant to be populated by... something? it's not clear what visual data you want the reader to imagine on these instruments
>signature of heat
is there a reason why you can't describe it as heat signatures?
>...”
most people will read ellipses as a lingering silence, as if the speaker's words are trailing off some place else. It would work for "the, uh...", but from the rest of the dialogue and action it seems like you want to give the impression of busy noisy comms with everyone frantically speaking over each other
for lines like these, you're looking for "guns to hit-", which would be read as an interruption
>“..Flash, Repeat: The muzzle fla...Right there! Right there! See it? left of...” The first voice continued.
I'll just fix all of the grammar mistakes in this line: '"...flash, I repeat: the muzzle fla- right there! Right there! See it? Left of-"'
it's awkward to have dialogue tags at the end of every line, I appreciate that it's also awkward to have a dialogue tag immediately follow interrupted dialogue since usually it would be someone else's speech or a noise that interrupts it, but you have many more options to portray noisy radio chatter which would be better than what you've done
it would be more effective to describe the chatter and the noises of it rather than transcribing exact lines of dialogue in a scene like this. You can pick out random bits and pieces of dialogue that come through clearly, but not one after another, and certainly not with ellipses
>a fraction of a moment
using two ambiguous terms, fraction and moment, to describe something that is universally understood as almost instantaneous (especially when you already describe the exact velocity), is very clunky, you don't need to complicate the image of gunfire
the shards in this line also have both singular and plural pronouns
>The walls of every building in the cave shook as the percussion of each shot spewed fire from the barrel of the 25mm autocannon. The rounds, all travelling at 1,100 meters per second, reached their destination a fraction of a moment later. A few meters from the target, the timer in each projectile caused them to explode into precut shards, creating a cone of death that slammed with supersonic speed into what it was fired at.
this line is frustrating to read, the reader isn't shown what is being firing at, it's only referred to as "their destination", "the target", "what it was fired at", which would make sense if you want to preserve tension by having it remain unknown to later reveal an unintended target, but then the ambiguity is resolved in the very next line...
>Entire shacks
>entire cave
>entire squads
you should read what you write outloud so that you can pick up on unintentional repetition like this, including the word "every", you've described the totality of this burst of fire four times, once was enough, or at least use more creative descriptions

>>25175963
thank you!

>>25175963
>>25175966

anything you like about it?

>>25175480

Your character seems ridiculously overpowered, single handedly fighting down waves of enemies for hours by the sounds of it. Without any danger its boring to read, no suspense.

Whats at stake? what does he have to lose?
Most stuff is supposed to go wrong for your main character and he needs to overcome hard challenges. If hes just chilling killing entire armies with ease, your story will be dry.

I would be more interested to read a really close battle which could of gone either way and the main character only just somehow survived it.

Also laughing or cheering characters mid action scene is peak reddit. It could maybe work depending if their was a long run up story line about him losing his mind but if hes just being a redditer and cheering or laughing and joking in an action scene its pretty cringe.

The world building is good though, and the pacing is nice and fast. You just need to make your main character suffer way more, you are being way to nice to him.

>>25175972
not really, but don't let that discourage you since it's just not a genre I'm interested in
I can only point out things that really need to be tidied up before the enjoyment of a scene can be considered, like issues of grammar or incoherent action

>>25175981
Fair, thank you anyway!

>>25175972
also if you'd like more general feedback on your prose, it was quite hard to follow what was happening and who or what the objects and subjects of each action were
you should look up "white room syndrome" (I've seen it described as the curse of knowledge as well) and try to develop a better sense of when you can be liberal with your use of pronouns versus when you need subjects/posessives to be named explicitly, when things in a scene need to be described versus when you can let the reader imagine the details themselves, and so on

>>25175913
Positive:
- Good dialogue. You avoid my pet peeve of clear dialogue in confusing and stressful combat scenes.

Areas for Improvement:
- Is this omniscient or close third? At the start, you seem to be focused closely on the experience of a single character, but later, seem to describe the scene from a non-character POV? If it is meant to be omniscient, fine, but I would try and ground what is happening more on individual experiences -- this should make it feel more alive and visceral.
- Economise: This is a tense scene, tense up each sentence like it is the string of an instrument you want to hit high notes. This should be done by cutting sentence length, and cutting words that can be cut.

>The building walls shook from the autocannon's percussion. Each round, travelling at supersonic speed, exploded into a cloud of shards before impacting its target. The effect on the resistance was devastating.

I assumed in this revision that that:
-The reader should already know it is in a cave?
-The auto cannon being 25mm is not really relevant information?
-Similarly, does the reader need to know that each round travels at 1,100 meters per second?
-I liked the detail about the exploding rounds -- this is a meaty detail -- but all the reader needs to know is that they explode before their target. They don't need to know that it is because of a timer.
-Supersonic speed: You have already described the 1,100mps. This is therefore redundant extra description. Choose one -- in my revision, I chose supersonic because it is cleaner.
-Cone of death: Don't need to overexplain this. Trust the reader to understand that a cloud of metal shards travelling at incredible speed is going to have a negative effect on the target's life prospects.

Just one more subtler example of economising:
-Entire shacks were shredded, bodies turned into mist. --> Entire shacks were shredded. Bodies turned to mist.

IMO cleaner and more punch.

Hope that helps. Might all be complete crap.

>>25176000
>>25176010

Gold, thank you! I guess I'm trying to get people to understand the action clearly but I end up overexplaining some details while leaving the actual experience feeling flat?

>>25176013
Yeah, I would say so. Treat writing less as an exercise in painting a picture, and more as guided imagination. The joy of reading comes through the creation of the a film in the head, and anything that slows the reel down is distracting.

When describing a range of mountains in the distance, I might give the reader some key details (jagged, black rock, snow capped), but I don't need to describe each valley and glacier, or the order of prominence, or the geological stratigraphy. As soon as I start doing that, the reader is going over what they have already created in their head.

>>25175480

I rewrote the first part to make the main character suffer much more. I also added some things to be at stake. I think it makes it feel more personal, with more risk, and thus more engaging.

Vardun did not know how long he'd been fighting, his entire body ached and he was starting to feel dizzy. Every now and then he became conscious of the blood flowing down his side under his armor. He knew was lucky to have survived that axe hit but it had pierced his armor and left a nasty cut. It was only a quick reflex swing of his sword that had stopped the follow up axe swing that would have killed him.

The darkspawn kept swarming out of the forest towards him endlessly. He found himself wondering if this was it. He did not have much fight left in him. His greatsword and ivory armour were slick with foul ichor and his lungs were burning like fire, yet still he grimly stood his ground – all that talk about the glorious, unvarnished truth of war from the general earlier in the day came back to him. Vardun glanced over at the generals decapitated body on the ground beside him, had the gods finally abandoned them? He cried out a prayer to the skies to Forossa the lost son, yet the god did not answer the call. Vardun felt exhausted, if they could not hold the line, the city behind them would be next.

He shuddered at the thought of the darkspawn roaming down the main street of the city murdering everyone. The old merchants in the market who ripped everyone off, the curvaceous whores in the whorehouses, the drunks in the taverns. They may not be much but they were his people and a last burst of rage bubbled up inside him. With a scream he called forth a soul spear from within him, hurling it into the throat of an ogre before forming a spectral axe in his off-hand and cleaving a hurlock close to him in two. A sudden break in the onslaught, he looked around and counted the remaining soldiers. 500 men had become 5. He laughed dementedly, spit and blood running down his face, the sound echoing and tinny within his helm. So this was it, this really was the final stand, His axe shifted into a greatsword, his dark eyes began to glow with a bright red light and the air around him began to hum. Another wave of darkspawn emerged from the forest and Vardun leapt at them, his giant axe swung in a massive arc bisecting 3 of them. The other beasts hissed and formed into an arc and closed in on him.

Vardun screamed at the top of his voice.

"Zwei vor gaan, Faraam!"

The scream tore from him, it sounded strained, ragged and yet defiant. his only thought now to get revenge on these beasts for all the people they were about to kill in the city behind him. Bloodlust burned in the beasts eyes, but he could see something else in their eyes. He realized it was fear. Not fear of him though, fear of something standing behind him. Vardun felt a chill run up his spine.

File: gettyimages-3074969-612x612.jpg (36.7 KB)

36.7 KB JPG

i wrote a short story, it's a little under 10k words, It's a science fiction, and my first attempt at serious writing. I'm a novice.
It's titled "Artificial Humane Household Hologram"
>https://docs.google.com/document/d/1XofFCueT38GWuSLOBDhDYrKdYbsbZ-FvANfzvsxQUqY/edit?usp=sharing
or
>https://pastebin.com/w3X8DAFv
The basic plot ; The sole survivor of a lab malfunction is trapped in an underground base with an malfunctioning dream altering device. It starts to torture him in longer and longer dream hells.
It was inspired directly by the short story "I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream" . I felt compelled to write my own take on that idea

>>25176032
thanks again!

>first novel is finished and edited and it’s getting prepped for release (going to give it a final pass over after I fix some formatting issues)
>know for a fact that it’s too long and controversial for trad publishing
>thinking of self-publishing it for free because IDGAF about profiting from it and just want people to read it

Would it be alright if I posted a link to a PDF of it here once it’s done and officially released? Would there be any interest in that? I’ve been lurking here for years and I feel it’s the kind of book a /lit/ audience might appreciate.

>>25176216
>Would it be alright if I posted a link to a PDF of it here once it’s done and officially released?
no, you must not post any writing in the writing general

File: 1722782358502600.gif (562.9 KB)

562.9 KB GIF

>>25175557
no worries about sounding bitchy, I asked for proper criticisms so I can see what might not fully mesh in an excerpt I threw together on a whim so it's all welcome.
> I was thinking I could try my hand at it
As the OP says
>Just do it
Even if it's awful, or shit, or generic or doesn't make much sense, it can be fun and you improve by trying.

>>25175576
>I think your names being so literal and standardfantasyslop
in my limited defense I have cheated very heavily and used Dragon Age Origins for the setting to try and shake off some rust, but thank you as well anon.

>>25175679
Thank you very much for these anon! I'll keep these in mind for if I ever write a proper story.

>>25175978
oh yeah this particular snippet idea is very much "what happens if I drop an absurdly powerful fighter into DA:O?" so there's not a great deal of background or the like done for him.
>Without any danger its boring to read, no suspense
maybe him beginning to rapidly lose steam the longer he fights - migraines, shakes, weakness and feeling drunk in a bad way from using sorceries so much in such a short period of time, and having to quit the field or risk dying would work?
>Whats at stake? what does he have to lose?
currently, not a great deal - he's effectively a berserker from a dead culture that I used for a quick snippet idea.
>you are being way to nice to him
any ideas on how to make him (or whatever actual character, maybe a, ex-Qunari or something, I use have some meat on the bone?

>>25176033
Ignore my previous question you already answered it, thank ye again for this anon.

>>25176364

all good, I think its easiest to see when you simplify the story to a guy getting up in the morning and going to work.

If you just tell the story of his actions of getting ready and going to work its boring.

If you add something at stake like if he is late he loses his job it adds some interest, but if the story simply follows his actions and he faces no challenges, arrives on time and keeps his job its a boring story.

If he faces losing his job, faces some really difficult challenges that push him to the edge but still makes it to work and just keeps his job that is more interesting again.

Then you just apply that structure to whatever you are writing about.

Almost everything that can go wrong for your character should. The person reading wants to see the character thrown into high stakes challenges and see how they react.

>>25176437
I don't think the pastebin owner even visits anymore.

Should I self publish my story or keep trying to trad publish?

>>25176437
I read this yesterday and it came off as not quite schizobabble but close. One of those stories where you can barely tell what they're talking about and what's going on

>>25176477
Do what you think is best

>>25175062
What kind of stuff do guys like these fellows in your photo typically read?

File: OIP-12.jpg (9.9 KB)

9.9 KB JPG

>>25176760
... but you did read it.

>>25176216
You might generate some transient buzz with a handful of anons skimming your work to post about it here once but if your hope is to grow a sizeable and loyal following of readers from 4chan I don't know if that's been done before. My own "not a fit for trad publishers but still want it out there" self-publication that I shilled violently hasn't been posted about since I stopped posting about it as far as I've seen. Then again the most popular author to come out of /lit/ is F. Gadner and that one's more famous as something like a lolcow than as an quality writer.
Which isn't to say that I've given up on my work. Despite the unlikeliness of "success" I'm going to sink hundreds into producing an audiobook and I'm almost finished working on another novella that ties into the first.

Im stilll writen fuck yo2.

>>25176800
Yeah, it felt like Frank was emulating oddball stuff like parts of Ulysses and that if I didn't finish it I'd look uncultured. Compare it against Dance of the Lizard's Tale by ex_kamau which is nearly illegible schizobabble

>>25176823
It's written like that to reward rereading, but I can imagine there were too many Easter eggs and double entendres for some audiences.

>>25176827
I dunno. I just have a big smear where my memory of the narrative should be. Something like an affair between an insane bald guy and a prostitute? Then some other characters come in and do some stuff (I couldn’t tell you what).
I think I usually reread stuff to re-explore a world/narrative/experience, gain a firmer understanding of the deeper themes/ideas, or both. Not to collect all the "easter eggs." I couldn't discern so much as a plot point within The Chemical Divorce so I doubt I'll ever reread it.

>schizobable
>Fantasy slop
>Litrpgs
>Sad lonely boy
Has anyone written anything remotely different from these four genres?

>>25175062
started tinkering with this story again. finished the first draft and reworked this chapter. if anyone feels like reading, thanks.

https://iannewman.blogspot.com/2026/01/out-of-closet.html

>>25176939
My novella is psychological horror/dark academia

>>25176939
yes. all four combined.

>>25176971
>Tense changes
>Homos
>Sad boy story
>No plot
>Forced Stupid quotes trying to sound "deep"
Not for me. This is honestly terrible. I don't know what's the point besides two fags crying.
>Ian looks up from the index card and sees that Ethan is looking at him. Neither of them knows what the fuck Ian is talking about. He looks down and continues.
How the fuck does Ian not know what Ian is talking about or thinking?

>>25176983
That falls under schizobable and sad boy. I bet if you posted your first chapter I would be right.

>>25176983
>My novella is psychological horror
No, you're just gay.

>>25177001
Probably a bad "chapter" to plop down, but I appreciate it.

>>25177004
>>25177007
It's not schizobabble. Sad boy might be on point but the protagonist is female and is less sad and more despicable. The title is Sinner’s Descent into the Depth of the Unreal and it's avaiable as an ebook on various retailers if you want to skim the sample for shitpost ammunition.

>>25177027
>Rosie, a bookworm, hates her life.
Sad boy/girl story
>She goes to an elite and nightmarish unified education institution where she lives with a beastly roommate. Her only escape is the establishment’s underground with its bizarre creatures and surreal experiences.
Schizobable
>76 pages
C'mon that's not even novella length

>>25177063
Reading the sample, it's serviceable, but a few things I would rearrange. Such as Rosie's description of Hannah. Should be earlier when we're first introduced to Hannah. I also would suggest having more internal emotions plague Rosie rather than her tell the reader what others are doing. For example even something as mundane as Hannah being a lacrosse player, have Rosie comment on lacrosse or something else

>>25176848
it's supposed to evoke the protagonist's hangover, though I get why some people would dislike it

>>25177063
You can't recognize schizobabble and it's probably because you write it

Do you guys write accents or just avoid them entirely?

>>25177077
Hannah is described throughout the story and I'm not going to frontload a story with one or three pages of straight description anon. And I can't make sense of your second suggestion. Rosie suffers emotions throughout. Your example seems non sequitur. You'll have to elaborate.

>>25177118
It's been a long time since I've been hungover but I didn't get that sense at all. Felt more like a crazy person living in crazy town.

>>25177278
Only when it denigrates minorities.

>>25177027
>The title is Sinner’s Descent
Yeah I know. And you're gay, autistic, and a regular thread shitter. Kill yourself.

>>25177290
I'm rubber and you're glue

>>25177278
I tend to rely on syntax (word choice/word order/sentence structure) to communicate that a character doesn't speak perfect English rather than playing with spelling

File: Screenshot 2026-03-30 141309.png (219.2 KB)

219.2 KB PNG

>>25177283
>Hannah is described throughout the story
I'm not saying describe Hannah. I am saying to have monologues with Rosie. Right now it reads as if Rosie is just commenting on shit.

Instead of writing
>Her strong arms gripped me tightly, stopping my lungs (stupid sentence).
>Inhaling her feminine odor (another stupid sentence)
Write more shit with how she feels about her Hannah hugging her instead of describing everything.
Even shit like
>Too close.

You also have tons of "male" writing patterns for a female MC. Girls don't think like men. You're writing what a man thinks a woman thinks.

>>25177278
i’ll write stuff like people speaking in ebonics or different languages intermittently but not full on accent like
>zhe quick blue fox yumps ovar zhe razy dog

>>25177509
Are you saying you want me to write emotional exposition? If so that's just not my style. I believe shit like Rosie thinking
>Too close.
is already made clear through the subtext. To dredge all that up into the text might inflate the word count but it's adding nothing substantive i-m-o. If anything it's only softening the narrative's blows.
I'm curious what kind of gender-based "writing patterns" you can cook up so elaborate on that.

>>25177463
You literally suck and fuck cocks no rubber eat manglue

Would you continue?

Astyu cut the head from the creature’s body with a small chert knife. His brow furrowed. The creature resembled a small man with slick grey skin like an eel’s. Its head bulged like a cactus bulb. Its eyes, black as obsidian, peered vacantly through narrow slits.
A dead demon… Astyu spat on the ground next to the body.
The elders told tales about such beings in the evenings by the fire. He never believed them, but now…

>>25177684
I have no narrative context to engage with
the prose is fine. inoffensive but charmless. the repeated use of ellipses is off putting
astyu is atleast a novel name
keep writing you dumb dork. you haven't done anything yet

>>25177684
Push yourself, brother. Every moment in your story is a chance to stretch your imagination. Try to think of a striking detail that feels true, uncannily *true*, and put it in this scene. Does the head expel a weird little sound as it's cut off? What does it feel like to cut off this thing's head? Is the skin surprisingly rubbery? Does the blood flow slower than expected, or carry a peculiar smell? Can you see the pattern of veins under the head's taut skin in this light, and does it remind Astyu of something incongruously innocent? Does the demon make a little expression as its facial muscles stop receiving signals from the brain? Just dance, man. It's your story.

>>25177684
>Astyu
How the hell do you even pronounce this?
>Ass-to-you?

>>25177734
>>25177761
Thanks for the input, really solid. I have more but I want the beginning to be engaging enough to keep a non avid reader reading it.

File: Screenshot 2026-03-30 165123.png (50.4 KB)

50.4 KB PNG

>>25177582
you have shit like this. It screams male brained.
>is already made clear through the subtext.
You don't have subtext when you're writing about smelling her "Feminine Odor" or "Her embrace swallowed me".

>>25177781
As-two

>>25177792
it also contradicts itself
>Disgust
>Sick
>Genius
But you're going to go find another something to defend your writing. I'm done here. You dont' want criticism. You want people to praise you as the next Tolstoy. I'm not your developmental editor. I am only a random anon telling you what I thought.

File: image (11).png (314.5 KB)

314.5 KB PNG

How's this setup?

>>25177820
Love it. Funny witty and clever. It's not just banal or slapstick, it's a true masterclass at dry irony and forth wall breaking.

>>25177820
make the car big, not small, so the audience will see it better. Change the orange streetlamps to purple. Dont be generic. Give the character Thomas the letter T displayed on his overalls so people know the first letter of his name. Make him lankier. Have the headlights flash more then once. When it says "Ethan smirks" make it "Ethan smirks like the fucking grinch." Use the word "tum tum." not "gut,"
Have Thomas initially say "No." when asked to drop the keys, and have Ethan explain "But i will shoot you if you dont. Look, i have a gun here."
THEN thomas drops the keys
Have hm nload the entire clip into him, not just two shots. The line "This is getting old." can be changed to "I am getting old" and have ethan rapidly age into an old man. After the line ; "It's done." have the voice on the other end say "Huh? What's done?" then ethan closes the phone and says "oops , wrong number."

>>25177820
Idk wtf those other anons are saying, but:
Be clearer in your descriptions
>in a sweater steps out.
of? I didn't realize it was the car, not a house or something, until later. Generally: front load your action blocks with specificity.
>All the lights are out
Clean this up
>Thomas takes exactly...
Are we watching thorugh the blinds, or did the camera go back outside?
Also, Thomas enters the house before Ethan says "Now he's gonna walk in and..."
>Ethan waits for him in the chair
He was already waiting, Thomas is now in the room, he's not waiting anymore.
>...drop the keys
Is this a V.O.? Or O.S.? Isn't he in the room? You might be over using V.O.
>The academics face
First, you missed an apostrophe, and just use his name. It's a screenplay, be specific.
>Grabs the keys
...from the floor, next to Thomas, I'm assuming?
>The car turns on
First: cars don't "turn on", they "start up". Second: people start them up, just say Ethan did it
Extraction points are at locations, not times. (Also, still V.O.?)
>The car drives off
We're still inside the car. Either take us back outside or describe this from the interior
I think you need to show passage of time before he chews the burger, but I forget the correct way to do that. I don't want to get out my style book right now.
>A car pulls in
To...? View? The driveway? The street? And we see this through the car's windshield?
>, who pops open...
New sentence, "He pops open..."
>Ethan is is stunned to watch...
Being stunned is an interior state. How can we, observing him, tell that he's stunned?

>>25177820
no camera direction?
take it to /tv/

>>25177870
Thanks for those, always useful. I’m working on being more economical, which is why some of it may feel vague.

>>25177888
Checked and yeah I don't know where your story is going, it's too early, it could be interesting, but there hasn't been a hook yet, so I don't know. All I can do is offer editing feedback.

>>25177921
Good to know. The hook was supposed to be that this guy knew exactly what the other guy was going to do and imply that he’s killed him before, but if it doesn’t land, it doesn’t land.

>>25177953
I may be misusing the word hook, but in my mind what you have is the setup: the existing state of the world; the characters are doing what they usually do. This world may be something out of the ordinary to us normal people, so it can be an interesting premise... but that alone is not much of a story. The hook is what breaks the characters out of their routine and gets us invested in finding out how they handle it, because now we know we're not about to just read/watch them go through the same thing they usually do. I'm reminded of the movie "Looper" where he kills people via time travel or something, and it's starts off fairly routine. It's interesting, but not enough to base a whole movie on. And then one day, he has to kill himself via time travel. That's when the story starts.

>>25177993
I got you. Yeah, there’s something like that coming up with the woman in the next scene. She’s the wife he murdered in his base reality, which is why he’s so stunned.

Haven't seen Looper in awhile. That's a good connection because I was trying to think of movies like this to watch

I'm done. I finished my edits for my Victoria story. What do I do with it now?
>try to traditionally publish?
>hire some fivver editor?
>throw it into the void known as amazon?

>>25178052
>>hire some fivver editor?
they will just use an llm

Give me your harshest critique on this little excerpt. It's for a scifi short story set on a jungle planet orbiting two blue suns. I'm mostly trying to describe the atmosphere of that world in this passage. Do note that I'm ESL and have almost no experience in this.
>Colors faded away, a livid tint prevailing. Coiling clouds of vapor blanketed the courtyard in a blueish mist. Grass glistened as if electric arcs flashed between the blades. His arms grayed as though the skin petrified. The suns, like two bright blue motes hovering side-by-side, blazed high; Ruben’s shadow was barely longer than a hand-span. None of the few clouds drifting across the cyan sky were about to shade him. It was unusual for someone to stroll around here at this hour, and for good reason. He could barely keep his eyes open against the glare, he felt his clothes moisten and stick to his skin, and droplets began trailing down his forehead—but Ruben continued, unabated.
>The courtyard was a sort of quadrangle, a grassy expanse dotted with trees and striped with white concrete-paved trails. The trees were of a range of tropical species imported from earth: palms, mahoganies, teaks, and ceibas, but with their fronds and leaves reddened so that they could thrive in the alien light. They were still dripping the morning’s rainfall. Squinting, Ruben saw the compound’s walls rear up behind the dormitory, and above the walls loomed the red treetops of the jungle beyond.
>Good news. Only now, while skipping and skirting puddles as he followed a trail straight to the dormitory, did the meaning behind these words become clear to him. He didn’t mind taking a shortcut through the muggy air. The grin on his increasingly wet face grew so wide that he might have felt embarrassed if there was anyone around to see it.

Anyone else feel like they end up lobotomizing their characters trying to make them more subtle and realistic? Like I either write them as an over-the-top trope or as some voiceless neutral person.

>>25178744
>a livid tint prevailing
>His arms grayed as though the skin petrified.
Feels like a purple prose problem where every sentence is peppered with large words and heavy description to force impact, and it ends up breaking the rhythm and flow instead. I would try to be more deliberate with your word choice and maintain a consistent style/tone.

>>25178744
My >>25178761 revision

>Colors faded away as coils of vapor covered the courtyard in a blueish haze. The grass glistened like electrictiy was flashing between the blades.. The suns, like two bright blue motes hovering side-by-side, blazed high; None of the few clouds drifting across the cyan sky were about to shade him. Ruben’s shadow was barely longer than a hand-span. His arms grayed as though the skin petrified. It was unusual for someone to stroll around here at this hour, and for good reason. He could barely keep his eyes open against the glare. His moist clothes stuck to his skin, and droplets began trailing down his forehead—but Ruben continued, unabated.
>The quadrangle courtyard was a grassy expanse dotted with a range of tropical trees and striped with white concrete-paved trails. The trees were of species imported from earth: palms, mahoganies, teaks, and ceibas, but with their fronds and leaves reddened so they could thrive in the alien light. They were still dripping the morning’s rainfall. Ruben saw the compound’s walls rear up behind the dormitory, and above the walls loomed the red treetops of the jungle beyond.
>He didn’t mind taking a shortcut through the muggy air. Good news. Only while skipping and skirting puddles along a trail to the dormitory, did those words become clear to him. The grin on his increasingly wet face grew so wide that he might have felt embarrassed if there was anyone around to see it.

>>25178744
>Coiling clouds of vapor blanketed the courtyard in a blueish mist.
to me "clouds" belong in the sky, having their position described later in the sentence adds unnecessary difficulty to developing the scene in my mind
if you want to reposition clouds to somewhere they don't belong, you could naively swap it over to become "The courtyard was blanketed in a blueish mist by coiling clouds of vapor"; constructing it like this then shows that the description itself needs further tinkering (clouds and mist in such close proximity feels unnecessary)
rearranging sentences like this reveals redundancies in your descriptions, and it can also be applied to where sentences appear in a paragraph, or clauses in a sentence
>Grass glistened as if electric arcs flashed between the blades.
i'm not sure how i ought to imagine this
>like two bright blue motes hovering side-by-side, blazed high
if you want to characterise them as motes I think they wouldn't be "blazing", mote seems to index something insignificant or imperceptible
>blueish mist
>bright blue motes
>cyan sky
if everything in this scene is blue, you should draw attention to this blueness as a whole composition, remarking on each of the colours that belong to individual parts of the scene isn't how people absorb scenery
to me it's also tricky to imagine bright blue mote-like stars against a cyan sky, wouldn't they be hard to see? if so, you should draw explicit attention to this fact somehow
>The courtyard was a sort of quadrangle
sort of? how does it differ from how a reader would typically imagine a quadrangle?
>They were still dripping the morning’s rainfall
this is awkward phrasing, "dripping" seems to describe a continuous action like a tap would drip, as if it's currently raining, and "rainfall" makes it sound more torrential than I imagine you're intending
I think this could easily be resolved by describing it as "dripping with", or "bedewed" if you meant for it to sound lighter like morning dew typically acts, or "drenched" if you want to keep it laden with moisture
>red treetops
you've already described the trees of this world as red in this paragraph
in total between the blue mist and the cyan sky and the graying arm and the white concrete I think you're describing the colours of far too many individual aspects of the scene, and it all clashes in my mind, it would be more effective to compare the shape of the canopy of the exterior jungle with the individual trees in the courtyard, describing them both as red in one passage without needing to repeat yourself
>these words
is this referring to a passage before this one? if it's referring to "Good news", that should be in quotation marks
>increasingly wet
now i'm genuinely unsure if it's raining or not, "increasingly" doesn't seem to do anything here, is condensation forming on his face like the dew on the leaves, since the rainfall was in the morning? if so, "increasingly" gives that much more alacrity and tension than it deserves

if your excerpt isn't properly formatted i won't read it, and many others won't either. every time someone says "no one ever gives me feedback", i know the nigger just pastes a wall into the post field. just take a screencap or something, please

>>25178744
Feels like this sequence is trying to do too much in too little time. Like all the different pieces of the setting (tropical trees, quadrangle corutyard, the clouds) are things Ruben should be experiencing or observing during his walk. I would try to drag it out and explain what Ruben a but more in between. Where is he going? Who is he? It's a lot of description in three paragraphs.

>>25175062
I’m a PoC, published since 2023, and I recently got featured in positive reviews in magazines. People obviously choose to read me because I’m a new and emerging voice. Yep, it feels good being part of diversity in publishing.

>>25177792
>>25177795
Never asked for your thoughts in the first place my friend. But I'm especially not sure why you posted because you don't seem to have any substantial thoughts.
>you don't have subtext because... you just don't okay?
>this passage is male-brained because... its just is okay?
>this contradicts itself because... it just does okay?
These are all things you cloud clear up by elaborating but you'd rather ragequit because you can't handle critique of your critique.

>>25178895
Great job anon we're rooting for you, post your book's title

>>25178910
Detransition, Baby

>>25178919
But Torrey Peters is white and that book was published in 2021

>>25178907
If you can't see why these are problems, don't bother posting

>>25178979
If you can't explain what the problems are, don't bother posting.

>>25178761
>>25178784
Thanks Anon. I've actually gotten that exact critique about word choice before from a friend. Something I'll need to keep paying attention to.
>breaking the rhythm and flow instead.
I think that about sums up what's bothering me the most when I reread my writing, but I couldn't put my finger on it. Everything feels constrained or "stiff".
>>25178808
Thanks for being thorough Anon. I'll keep everything here in mind.
>if you want to characterise them as motes I think they wouldn't be "blazing", mote seems to index something insignificant or imperceptible
I was trying to show that they appear smaller than our sun in the sky, but they still shine brighter nonetheless.
>is this referring to a passage before this one?
Forgot to point out that "Good News." is italicized.
>>25178826
Thanks Anon.
>I would try to drag it out and explain what Ruben a but more in between.
Definitely.

Do you guys read the New Yorker fiction?

File: 1774176724975183.png (362.7 KB)

362.7 KB PNG

So I've finally finished my own self read through and line edit of my novel after letting it sit for a pretty long time. And i have a month before I hand it off to an editor. But I find myself kind of hating the entire manuscript. At points it feels too preachy, others too sentimental and saccherine, and overall a feeling of "its just kind of shit." I've had beta readers tell me they really enjoyed it, even gave plenty of good feedback of what to fix. The parts that make me want to go Hotline Miami finisher move on this stupid goddam project were things the readers didnt even notice. Do I need to let go and let the editor have at it? Give them a list of my insecurities and concerns, and let them do what they get paid to do?

Odi et amo
Or something

>>25179477
if this isn't your life's work what's it matter? send it off, refine it best you can, publish it, and move on

>>25179490
I needed this. It's hard to grapple with putting so much time into something and going "its okay I guess.." But that's part of learning and growing. Yet I have a certain grief for the novel I didn't make, the one that could have been had I been better. And maybe even a minor contempt for the one I did make.

Well, my novel is complete, more or less.

https://cityofflies.substack.com/
https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/90003/city-of-flies

Gonna do a final pass after I get some feedback, but it's in a shareable state, and I intend to get it sellable sometime this Summer. I've consistently not gotten support from this board, but if anyone is interested now that it's finished, there are the links.

>>25179680
How many words are we talking? I might do a reading swap with you if you're interested, because I'm in a similar spot.

>>25179523
I understand the feeling. with any creative work its easy to focus on fulfilling the imagined ideal you have for it. I get pointlessly stressed over this and get in my own way all the time. I've found that the whole mentality should be treated as a mental roadblock. it'll send you down pointless and distracting paths trying to solve the shortcomings and issues you see. but this mentality is ultimately perfectionism, and perfectionism isn't something to be solved, it's something to be pushed through
the way I look at is that if your journey as writer isn't ending on this piece of writing, why are you stopping here? spending time improving one piece comes at the expense of improving your overall abilities. illustrators know that to improve at drawing you should continually complete new drawings, and writers know that every writer has 100 shit stories in them
you can't really observe the work process of a skilled writer the way you can in other crafts. you can go into a craftsman's workshop and see them deftly handle their tools, efficiently complete tasks, flying through a project and putting out great results. you can see them work and compare them to yourself, and there's a tangible sense of cause and effect between their years and skills. no such thing with writing. you just have to have faith in the process
finish your shit. if its your first completed novel, you'll get a strong sense of pride and satisfaction. if it's not, finishing up good work is always satisfying and seeing that you're worried about all this at all I'm sure you've put in a respectable effort. give yourself respect for the effort you've put in so far and follow through
goodluck anon

>>25179680
>royalroad
you'd probably get more attention in /wng/. nothing against webnovels personally but there's a whole thread dedicated to them
>sellable
despite having already put it up online for free? publishers typically hate that

>>25179714
>>sellable
>despite having already put it up online for free? publishers typically hate that
I'm open to publishing this traditionally, but don't see it as likely. It's obviously book one in a series (one I won't be finishing any time soon) and doesn't have a clear angle for marketing. If I sell it to a big company, I suspect it will be years from now after I've written more of a catalogue. I do wonder if I've hurt myself by putting chapters up one at at time, but I doubt it's worth fussing over. If 20 people having read the second draft is that big a deal, then I'll just keep it as a personal project and sell a few copies where I can.

Thanks for reminding me about /wng/. Will drop it there.

>>25179702
>>>25179680 (You)
>How many words are we talking? I might do a reading swap with you if you're interested, because I'm in a similar spot.
73k. I'm open to the idea, although it depends on what level of feedback you are looking for.

>>25179711
You're absolutely right. It is my first completed novel. And I do feel very proud of finishing. But it's been awhile since I've completed the novel, so the shine has worn off. And doing the second draft made me see how much work was needed. But I'm still left with a feeling of incompleteness and want. Perfectionism, as you said. So its time to start my next one while I wait for my editor. And I have some ideas. Thank you for these encouraging words!

>>25178052
it's time to start organizing the release party. we can all chip in i think for some champagne and potato chips. if we get a good collection going, i will bake a nice cake with real buttercream and everything. if you like, we can make it chocolate. it's going to be beautiful. does anybody have a karaoke machine?

>>25179680
I made it to the end of the first scene break in the first chapter. I'm not willing to wait any longer for the story to get interesting.

>>25175480
This anon here again, updates to this personal autism idea (these are set long before this excerpt, which is - ideally - towards the very end of it if I ever get that far with it)
>checking the word count for the two "finished" chapter drafts
>first chaper is 2.5k words, very nice
>second chapter is a fucking eye-watering 3.9k words
fucks sake, do I cut it down now or later?

>>25177684
>Astyu
Stopped reading right there

>>25175610
can’t even access it bruddah

File: Screenshot_20260331_233241_Docs.jpg (21.1 KB)

21.1 KB JPG

Everybody, I'm writing kino

Started actually writing my project today. It's about a government agency that employs mind readers, I posted about it a while ago. About 9 weeks coming up with ideas and planning, came up with the actual cast of characters about 3 weeks ago, came up with the general plot outline over the last week and a half. The concepts and themes involved have been kicking around in my head for a while longer and the characters even longer than that, but this is the time I spent to actually put them on paper and develop them out. I have several scenes sketched out but I started with an opening scene to be placed right at the start.
I think when I finish writing this whole thing I'll look back and decide it's a bunch of ugly retarded nonsense but for now it feels like something I both enjoy writing and feel a need to put onto paper. Will post the completed first chapter draft when done if anyone is interested.

>>25180415
sounds fun

How to actually write better prose?

>>25180825
Make a conscious effort to write worse and then start writing normally again

My story is far too transgressive for publishers and a lot of retailers. What would be the best way to find an audience for it?

>>25180849
If you ever figure that out, let us know

>>25180849
My problem is that I don't have a defined genre. My short is at the same time romance/scifi, public for both would feel uncomfortable.

>>25180888
In my case, I do have a defined genre, but my novel has some Lolita-tier content in it that’s important for the story. I’m hesitant to publish it through official channels because I feel as though some publishers would reject it outright without even considering the narrative context.

>>25180899
I feel you need some notoriety to write these sort of stories. Nabokov was already famous when he wrote Lolita, right? Plus, he was a master and his prose was fantastic. You'll probably need something like that to get published. But if you think it's really good, I'd try self-publishing.

>>25180938
Oh, self-publishing is my planned route, but my concern is that if I publish it to places like Amazon, Barnes and Noble etc., they’ll just ban the thing outright regardless of quality because there’s more hysteria around the subject matter now than there was in Nabokov’s day. The novel is completely finished save for a final pass, so I was actually considering posting it here on /lit/ for free and then archiving it for free reading and download if all else fails.

>>25180948
Well, try it first to get actually published. You never know, maybe catch the editor in a good day. If not, try Amazon. If they ban it, it is what it is. After that I'd try these online chapter-by-chapter websites. If nothing works then, let it go and move on to another story.

If your pronouns are they/them then do you say “I” or “we?”

File: _91408619_55df76d5-2245-41c1-8031-07a4da3f313f.jpg (54.3 KB)

54.3 KB JPG

>>25181010

>>25180849
You have to develop a socialk media following now

>>25181010
You say nigger/faggot

Anyone here tried to publish on Smashwords?

>>25179761
Mine is 125k words. I'm not looking for full editorial feedback. What works, what doesn't, what needs fixing. Not how to fix it, just notes being like "this feels xyz" or "this phrase is overused" or "this is/isnt working"

starlight.beta.reads@gmail.com
If you're interested.

Is it even worth writing if it’s just going to be genreslop?

>>25181621
bro, just transcend the genre

>>25181627
I don’t do drugs.

you guys is there a new captcha on this site? or is it a virus

File: 1755309051784637.png (215.6 KB)

215.6 KB PNG

>think of writing science fiction
>realize I don't know any real science, I'm just a code monkey
Novels for this feel?

>>25181654
You can do computer science fiction like AI and VR stuff.

>>25181654
do what the great science fiction writers did and let your technical experience color your perspective
good scifi is just logical extremes turned into speculative fiction

>>25181635
It's an April Fools joke.

>>25175480
>sharlock
>hurlock
>genlock
Okay.

Anyways, it's a nice scene though without context I'm not sure I care beyond "this feels cool". It reads like an anime scene, desu.

Curious on some feedback for this. What comes to your heads, whether you like it or whatever you find to critique. I want to post the whole scene but it's about 700 words long so I'll just post the first half of it:

Under those cold stars that laughed, light years away in indifference, Joam shivered down to his very bones, lying on the damp deck of his ramshackle ship. Cold sweat ran down his body and fire down his insides. He had thrown up more than enough that night, and the boat rocked sickeningly under him. The smell of the sea, once comforting to him, now gagged him like an apple stuck in his throat. Pain was on his fingers as if they were hogtied— and all this, with the musk of the boat’s floorboards, made him close to fainting. A convulsion went through him as something sang far away in the horizon. They sang:

“Red sky night, sailor’s delight!
Red in the morning, sailor’s warning!
Italy’s there at midlight!
Jas up file an’ vorin!”

And there were drums and flutes and strings accompanying this across the ocean air. Joam mumbled something in answer.

“Quiet, now,” Areia said, taking a cloth she had cut and dabbed at Joam’s forehead, “Try and rest.”

“Tell them to stop singing,” Joam said, shaking like a leaf in a windstorm, “Tell them… Tell them that I do not want to listen.” He swallowed bile and dared to open his burning eyes towards the burning sky, “Let me sleep.”

“Shh,” Areia said, her eyes shining in the moonlight and her braid over her shoulder, “You’ll sleep soon enough. Quiet. I’ll fetch you a blanket.”

In the sky there were things that moved around like serpents that painted a vast, dark canvas. Things—not men—were riding those paint-like snakes made of color and ink; songs came from them, as well, much more faraway and unearthly.

A soft rain now came (it had to be rain, though, the drops were hot!) and through the rain came stories and in the raindrops figures formed and told stories of an angel that was not humane. That a curse had to be given to someone else and if this were to happen, Joam would have to call out so that the curse could be cast out far away.

>>25181695
Youre face is a joke.

I'm gonna stop reading Dan Simmons' lecture on writing. This is getting fucking demoralizing. Nigger wants me to study Buddhism now.

>>25181765
good job, anon, i read the whole thing which is more than i can say for most excerpts i see here
>paragraph 1, too many adjective-noun pairings in a row, e.g. "damp deck of his ramshackle ship",
pick one and let it do the heavy lifting for the sentence
>"boat rocked sickeningly under him"
sickeningly is just a clunky word in general, i'd rework the sentence to use a different form e.g. "another sickening rock of the ship"
>"paint-like snakes"
drop the 'like'. you've already talked about a canvas and it undermines the visual, trust your metaphor and just call them 'paint snakes'
hope this helps

>>25180071
I always feel like I failed if my chapter is only 2.5k words or so. 4k is actually my goal chapter length, or maybe more like 3.5k. I'm a chronic underwriter though.

>>25181949
>>paragraph 1, too many adjective-noun pairings in a row, e.g. "damp deck of his ramshackle ship",
>pick one and let it do the heavy lifting for the sentence
not the writer. I disagree. it's a cute phrase, has rhythm

>>25181977
true. writer, please feel free to ignore the below at the risk of warping your style to suit my exact tastes

my main issue, since it was my first impression, was seeing it three times the first sentence
>cold stars > damp deck > ramshackle ship
which to me is usually indicative of amateurish writing, which, if i'm reading an amazon sample or chapter 1 on RR, would be slightly offputting even when you consider the author didn't do it again at all for the rest of the excerpt

if i were to move the sentence break, it becomes better when i read it in my head since the period is like a reset point for the adjectives
e.g.
>Under those cold stars that laughed, light years away in indifference, Joam shivered down to his very bones. Lying on the damp deck of his ramshackle ship, cold sweat ran down his body and fire down his insides.
HOWEVER the flow is completely ruined (again with the huge caveat that it's my pet peeve and may not make a difference to literally anyone else) because it would have two sentences the same length and rhythm one after the other. considering that, i'd add the next sentence to the previous, which reads better to me
>Under those cold stars that laughed, light years away in indifference, Joam shivered down to his very bones. Lying on the damp deck of his ramshackle ship, cold sweat ran down his body and fire down his insides--he had thrown up more than enough that night, and the boat rocked sickeningly under him.

>>25181765
>Under those cold stars that laughed, light years away in indifference
I'm just here thinking: what does this even mean?

damn i just got an idea for a story from a webm
ideas really do come from anywhere these days

GAHHHH I KEEP STARTING NEW STORIES AND WORKING ON OTHER ONES THAN REVISING THE ONE I NEED TO

My short takes place in a 19th century-esque period. People here have mentioned that the prose feels a bit outdated. That is partially intended. But I'm thinking, I'm not Jane Austin and this isn't the 19th century. Should I just make it easier for the reader and use modern-ish prose? What do you guys think?

>>25182202
>creative aspirations
you know better than readers
>jobbie aspirations
you serve the readers

>>25182202
do you know how to write the way you're trying to write, or are you just pretending?

>finish a story 2 years ago
>decide to open it back up
>read the first few chapters
>this is absolute shit
>begin editing it again
Will it ever end?

At some point, my main character goes through major physical alterations and a personality change to something crazier, should he be "crazy" just because his weird thoughts are spoken out loud, or what else would show that he's not all right in the head?

>>25182410
maybe his actions?

>>25182410
you should probably develop a better understanding of what's happening to your character, and why/what you're trying to do. this question demonstrates that you aren't really there yet.

>>25182285
Isn't that the great question.

>>25182410
You should trust your reader more and be more subtle about it

>I've been writing something but I'm not sure what happens next. What should I write happens next?
half the questions in this general

>>25183596
unironically a good question though

wonder why there is no book with the title Writ in Water yet, its the epitaph of poet John Keats who died too early

>>25183651
>Writ in Water
>Nina Selbst
>3.73
>15 ratings4 reviews
>During a long career as an economist, involved in the mundane business of water management, the author of Writ in Water caught glimpses of the many and varied links between water and the human experience. Retirement gave her the leisure to satisfy the curiosity that these aroused and the freedom to explore the multiple meeting places of water and humanity, over time and place.The book which emerged, views the world through the rippling, complex lens of water.
>Published November 8, 2015

>>25183651
There's a whole book about it. Two whole books. They're called Hyperion and Fall of Hyperion.

Just finished my story. I am euphoric.

>>25183638
No it isn’t. If you’re too stupid to know what to write then you have no business writing.

This 18 year old girl got a book deal and your'e still stuck on /lit/. She writes better than you do, has better stories, and far superior to anything you've done thus far. How do you feel about that?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZNGshwOcPO0

>>25184056
>DEI slop
Miss me with this shit.

>>25184060
>WAH WAH WAH MUH WHITE COCK
Just admit this bucktooth flat faced SE asian girl writes English beter than you do

>>25184071
You seem upset.

I don’t understand the appeal of “detailed magic systems.” Wouldn’t the people who laud Sanderson’s shit get their jollies just as well by reading a D&D ruleset?

>>25184077
You seem like a retarded faggot

>>25184083
It's like comparing a physics textbook with the D&D player's handbook. It's closer to hard sci-fi than to lit-rpg

>>25184083
because when i don't have a "detailed" magic system, it becomes "Super Saiyan I don't have to explain shit."

>>25184083
I don't get it either. I have to assume that it helps readers with poor reading comprehension grasp on to some kind of structure to the story that they otherwise wouldn't be able to parse.

>>25184100
Most ancient authors operated on that exact logic when writing myths.

World building is a meme. If you don’t have a good story, character and themes, no one will give a fuck about how magic in your universe works.

File: 1661468556111.png (143.2 KB)

143.2 KB PNG

>>25175490
I don't care if this post is four days old. "Reddit spacing" isn't a thing. Stop being a newfag retard.

File: nyk5fp5cqrsg1.jpg (221.7 KB)

221.7 KB JPG

>>25184201
not for forums and posts, because nobody knows how to indent on a website. But in manuscripts and drafts, they use spacing to indicate new paragraphs instead of an indent. This is Reddit spacing.

>>25184201
>>25175490
>>25175480
Say whatever the fuck you want but this
>>25184215
is way more accessible and readable than this
>>25184118
I'm only talking about how it looks, not the grammar or word choice

File: IMG_1452.jpg (470.5 KB)

470.5 KB JPG

How do you stay positive after seeing great writing and knowing you’ll never be that good?

reddit spacing as an insult only makes sense in non-writing threads. formatting to improve readability is a writing fundamental

the only reason indenting exists as an alternative is to save printing costs because whitespace costs physical pages in books and so it was a cost saving measure to put a tab at the start instead of separate with newlines. in the internet age we moved to empty lines because it's much clearer and there's no such thing as pages

you would know this if you knew anything about writing, its history, and why we do what we do at fucking all

as for 4chan specifically, the only reason you would refuse to add extra lines is cringeworthy 4chan hyper pride "omg im an og and i don't space my paragraph haha newfags" which is unimaginably gay. you're one step removed from an actual redditor if you think in these hivemind terms

>>25184298
DCC also depressed me. It took something I genuinely despised (litrpg) and made an actually good book out of it. How

>>25184308
Well, that's an answer at least. Thanks

Adding or removing spaces between paragraphs doesn't influence readability whatsoever. The way you make your writing readable is by maintaining clarity. As long as you're consistent with whatever choice you make, either is fine.

>>25184396
so what is your logical reason for why the vast supermajority of professional online writing spaces moved to using empty lines? because it doesn't matter and it was totally random alignment?
grow up you actual child

>>25184410
They do it that way because many others do it that way. You can do it the way many others do it or you can do it the other way. The only ones who'll have a problem with it either way are disregardable autists like (you)

Now I'm wondering what the page count of my novella would've been if I had elected to use reddit spacing.

>>25184423
>the standard way of formatting writing changed cuz other people do it that way lol
good fucking god you are pathetic. shoot me in the head if i ever lose my sapience like this

>>25184429
>good fucking god you are pathetic. shoot me in the head if i ever lose my sapience like this
one of my characters talks exactly like you and i'm stealing this line

>>25184429
Cite me some legitimate sources saying reddit spacing is "the standard" if it's so standard
>>25184437
Your character talks like an idiot

>>25184443
your argument changed from "the reason it's standard is because other people did it, making it the standard" to "it's not actually the standard, SOURCES NOW??"
i wonder if you even realize you're the npc

>>25184311
Oh cool you have no taste.

>>25184451
You're putting words in my mouth and ignoring my point. You lose the argument.

>>25184298
When I first heard about litRPG I got excited because I thought it would be a new evolution of the COYA novel but nope it's this.

>>25184716
*CYOA

How much of an AI purist are you when it comes to writing?
Which of the following do you find acceptable?
>having AI write out whole scenes or chapters for you and then just making edits
>having AI draft scenes and making significant edits or rewrites to them
>having AI give you ideas or suggestions for scenes, chapters, setting content, or characters
>having AI compare your written chapters or scenes to your written story outline/lore-book/character sheet to check for internal consistency
>having AI read your chapters or scenes and check for grammatical mistakes only

>>25184722
>>having AI give you ideas or suggestions for scenes, chapters, setting content, or characters
only nomenclature and drafting up bureaucratic sounding nonsense since i'm terrible at it
>>having AI compare your written chapters or scenes to your written story outline/lore-book/character sheet to check for internal consistency
claude's decent at this but there are some continuity issues he flags that don't exist, although this is a flag in itself to clarify the objects in a scene
>>having AI read your chapters or scenes and check for grammatical mistakes only
yes, and feedback because i'm insecure enough to enjoy the validation

>>25184722
AI hallucinates and has no subtlety. I find it works best with grammar and word choice

>>25184722
>>25184727
and I forgot to include, word choice when I'm blanking on a specific term or can't find an adjective/verb that fits the tone, the tone suggestions only work about 10% of the time though

Hiya /lit/ wanted to stop in and drop this thing I had been writing for the past few weeks for a college class and just finished tonight, figured maybe you guys might wanna give it a read, its not super long. It however is the most bleak and fucked up thing I think I've ever written so hope you guys like it :D
https://pastebin.com/k8jBX6DG

>>25184722
Using it for directly generating your writing defeats the purpose of writing.

>>25184829
Are you a woman? Either way not a fan. Fascination with childhood abuse disgusts me and you didn't even convey the hopelessness or whatever of the main character very well. No one needs more true crime inspired slop.

File: ff2pg.png (490.6 KB)

490.6 KB PNG

Been a while i have given it a crack once more it makes me feel good and happy to be doing something creative.

i've thought of a title. I have an idea where it should go. I read it with my accent, there is a second half to it which i just suck at because they aren't supposed to be "foreign"

I think my prose has improved since last year, i still don't know how to do dialogue.

Is it too weird? is weird in a good or bad way?

i've been using deepseek for grammar and english advice, i think it points me in the right direction though to be honest i'm not sure i didnt pay enough attention in english class.

>>25185007
The excess newlines and italicization are very jarring and unpleasant to me in particular BUT that cartoon lady embodies 60% of my sexual fetishes so it gets a 10/10 from me.

I think you're trying to use techniques from poetry to evoke particular feelings but it feels like a sledgehammer of quirky formatting. IDK though.

>>25185023
was that comment really necessary

>>25185027
Yes, it made me laugh when I wrote it

>>25185032
are you going to say something about the writing

>>25185034
I did, the writing is fine, pretty interesting, but the over engineered formatting makes it hard for me to enjoy. I'm not a sophisticated man.

>>25181010
They/them is to remove gender, not to establish the person is plural. Since “I” is non-gendered it would still be used. Try thinking instead of being transphobic. This isn’t /pol/.

>>25185044
You would say "we" because "they" and "them" are both plural

>>25184056
>finishing a book is an accomplishment you should be proud of because not a lot of people will ever get to do that
shoulda said because it's difficult, not a comparisonmaking. Eh, shes only 18

>>25184056
>YA
go to fucking hell dude

>>25184722
>having AI write out whole scenes or chapters for you and then just making edits
Overuse
>having AI draft scenes and making significant edits or rewrites to them
Overuse
>having AI give you ideas or suggestions for scenes, chapters, setting content, or characters
It's not gonna come up with anything that creative but this is fine.
>having AI compare your written chapters or scenes to your written story outline/lore-book/character sheet to check for internal consistency
Based on my experience with AI it's going to come up with problems that aren't there and miss the ones that are there.
>having AI read your chapters or scenes and check for grammatical mistakes only
Basically all it's useful for.

So I'm writing a novella in which the MC is (among other things) terminally online zoomer. It's not by any means the focus of the story, but I still need to have moments where he references something he saw or someone he met online. How do I do this without it coming across as cringe, dated and "hello fellow kids"-esque?

I was thinking of just being as vague as possible, not directly naming any specific websites/memes/communities/etc, and only making reference to "an image board", "a messaging app" and so on. Do you think this would work?

>>25185007
Look anon your content is genuinely interesting and I would read more about this character. But the other guy is right. The excessive formatting and whatever arty farty thing you're trying to do is neither necessary nor pleasant. To the point where I just stopped halfway down the first page and moved on to the second, and when I re-read them together I realized I had missed absolutely nothing by doing so.
There's a balance to be found between writing you enjoy creating and writing your readers will enjoy reading. I'm not saying don't write in your own style. The second page is mostly fine and your subject matter interests me way more than most of the generic genreshit getting posted here.

>>25185531
They feels very rough and I suppose it's a first draft. I've read other passages of your story and I have to ask: should your character feel like he's going through a non-stop mental episode? This can get tiring for a reader, I think. And you can cut that last paragraph entirely. You don't need to write "we exited the train" with so many words, likely you don't need to write that at all.

>>25185007
Is this supposed to be a hybrid of a poem and a novel? I confess I haven't read this style before. People will find it weird. The other guy is right, this is weird and good on a gooner sort of way. I'd read this because I'm interested in this stuff (I've written a guy goes into a woman's body before) but unless you get really good later on, that's how people will see it and women everywhere will wrinkle theirs noses at this. The writing itself is not bad. It's not good prose, let me tell you, but it's serviceable.

>>25185587
You've already written the doors were about to open. The reader will infer they arrived at the station, and since they've arrived, they'll leave the train (unless for some reason they stay there, and that you would need to write).

>>25185587
>I don't think he's meant to be having a mental breakdown constantly, I'm just writing him to be relatable
Also, at least here I think you're failing at that. People don't really go into these sort of Ecclesiastes epiphanies, and they certainty don't dissociate as if they're drinking a cup of tea. The best way to make a character relatable is to make them normal people thinking about mundane stuff. He's seeing the station through the windows, a normal person would likely think about how big or small it is, how dirty, how crowded. A smart person will think: is this easy to navigate? Where is the nearest exit. My advice is not try to channel Clarice Linspector at every scene.

>>25185614
Don't take it the hard way. Maybe try to think how the character is feeling at the moment. He's anxious about meeting new people, right? Instead of saying "he's anxious," think of what an anxious person would do. Is he the type of person to use small talk to drown it? Maybe he refuses to look at the station at all. Or he focuses on the handsome guy he's obviously in love with.

>>25185531
So you're saying I should directly reference big mainstream websites/apps but be more ambiguous about ones like 4chan? Thank you anon, that sounds like solid advice. The thing is the MC does use the 4chan-adjacent side of the internet a lot. But I'm sure I don't need to give specifics about what sites he uses to watch gore and shit.

How do you write when you know that you'll get cancelled and publicly shamed for all the heinous shit you've done if you achieve any notoriety or acclaim?
Asking for a friend.

>>25185589
...
i don't want the "gooner sort of way" i'm trying my hardest to avoid it.
There is a story to it there are many more pages im just not particularly proud of them at the moment.
I want it to be a real story, not something undesireable.

Premise is obvious i think
>ladyboy eunuch dreams of being a Man
>>25185554
Idk i thought it would be easier to read that way, maybe im just retarded like that.

>>25185713
>i don't want the "gooner sort of way" i'm trying my hardest to avoid it.
Well, you are not avoiding it.

File: 1768510226711185.jpg (723.4 KB)

723.4 KB JPG

Can I get feedback on this?

>not really a story, more of an aphorism; I would be interested if a similar sentiment was expressed elsewhere (almost certainly). Advice also most welcome.

Afterlife is filled with golden, Olympian laughter; the dead are relieved from their earthly suffering and laugh looking at the living. Endless toil for their whole life so easily escapable by joining the dead. The supreme comedy; everything the living have ever created and are striving to create is backwards. They are crazed by life, trying to cling to it by any means. They grasp for meaning, pleasure, anything to make it more tolerable, doing anything to live. This must be an amusing sight for the dead. He might look at a great man, a philosopher, a founder of a new religion, using everything he has for a teaching that will make their lives easier to bear. The dead onlooking wants to exclaim “No, no, You are going backwards, this is the wrong way” but the words cannot escape his lips, because he cannot contain his laughter

I have a setting for a fantasy story, glimpses of the main characters, but not really a plot. That's what constantly happens.

>>25185717
I'm not writing erotica

i want it to be uncomfortable and weird, but in an intentional way.

>>25185750
You began with a picture of an half-naked hot Egyptian goth cartoon, then went on to describe her impressive bust, round hips, and slender legs. My first thought was: "Dude was cursed my Imotep and woke up in the body of a goth Egyptian girl." If later I found out it was femboy I'd be aroused, but other people would probably be weirded out. If you want this to be uncomfortable and weird don't make him a hot goth Egyptian girl.

>>25185736
Love this

I'll never understand how people hate editing. I'm like 70% done with my shit draft and I really just wanna stop and go back to the beginning to start the editing process so badly.

Maybe it's just me but typing up slop to get the story onto the page makes me feel like shit, whereas taking slop and refining it into something passable is what REALLY makes me feel like an author.

>>25185713
Your readers aren't stupid. The second page conveys everything the first page does, but in a way that's much more natural and engaging to read.
As for the gooner thing, to me it reads less like deliberate erotica and more like you're simply engaging with a topic that some people will inevitably goon to. You know the movie The Skin I Live In, where the man being forcibly transformed into a woman is played for horror? Plenty of trannies goon to that. So what? Whatever. You can't police them.

>write what you want to write
>write what you'd want to read
Which is the correct approach?

>>25185728
I like the premise a lot, I love fantasy-with-guns, but I admit I laughed out loud when the second paragraph started with "the goblin pits". The first felt kind of like an 1800s romance so the stylistic transition to "goblin pit" was very jarring (in a funny way that wasn't particularly unpleasant but idk if that's what you want). Maybe find a different way to describe it, maybe more circumspect. Iirc Tolkien would sometime use less direct language when talking about certain horrible things that lent a more serious tone. "Goblin pits" sounds like how a teenager would refer to that place when taunting his younger brother and threatening to send him there, if that makes sense. Keep writing it though, I'd like to see the rest.

>>25185570
Probably, but in my headcanon is isn't

>>25185750
Why did you give the cartoon such a sexy outfit then? Not really complaining it's just a weird thing to do if you're trying to do non-erotic stuff.

>>25186049
Thanks a lot for the feedback. I thought "goblin pits" would be appropriate but maybe it does sound juvenile. It's basically a hole where goblins store food (people) though so what else could I call it that would also feel somewhat dramatic?

>>25186068
Juvenile isn't even the right word it's just kind of a mismatch with the feel of the surrounding prose imo. You could maybe try describing his circumstances rather than the specific place: "When one is taken", "in captivity", "in that horrible place", or "taken by the goblins", idk. I think (and I did get abused somewhat as a kid so I'm projecting the way I talk about it, might just be me) when people think about a past traumatic event their trauma bleeds through into how they talk so it tends not as clinical, complete (?), or straightforward as someone else might describe it.

I think the word goblin has also accrued a semi-whimsical quirky feel in the last few years which might be throwing me off as well.

Don't just take my word for it though, I'm not a great writer and this is all particular to me.

>>25186081
No, thanks, this is great. I really need to think this through. My idea was to hook the reader in the very first lines so I put the traumatic event right there, just after 'the promise' of the story. It is, in essence, a romance story with a twist, so I'm not sure either how people will feel once it progresses. Prose okay?

>>25184298
*That's* what litrpg means? This is just gamified isekai slop.

>>25185928
Actually seen that movie, kinda mid ngl.

I'm not playing it for horror, it's supposed to be more absurd in some don quixote derived way. My idea is to have him side with foreign conquerors because they offer him the chance to be a "man"
I find the mirror bit important to drive the point as early as possible bc i had some people confused on the premise in an early early draft.
>>25186056
Eh? kind of the point? Take away everything man from him? make it clear to all he is something else, an object? I have to rewrite the rest because it's all kind of shit but he and five other eunuchs are supposed to tend to a temple and they exist in this state of "to be observed but looking is forbidden" they are reduced to ritual objects. Men removed as far from manhood as possible, which means that.
I'm not home for the holidays youre gonna have to bare with me till then.
>>25185764
I see. Good lord.
He can't be ugly, what's the point if he's ugly? What's the point if he's barely effeminate? go big or go home.

>>25186187
>gamified isekai slop.
anon... what did you think the term could mean other than that?

>>25186190
>they are reduced to ritual objects. Men removed as far from manhood as possible
Yeah what you're describing is 1:1 a significantly popular tranny (and generally bdsm) fetish. I'm surprised you don't know this. Sorry anon.

>>25186190
>He can't be ugly, what's the point if he's ugly? What's the point if he's barely effeminate? go big or go home.
I get your point yes, BUT you can still make him beautiful and feminine without 'saying' he's beautiful and feminine. There's where the skill of a writer comes in. It won't be easy to write this, ngl. Try this: write the character as if you were writing a woman that wishes to be a man. Think like a woman when writing this: don't go into physical descriptions of how gorgeous the femboy is or how alluring his eyes are, that's your male mind speaking. Let your interior female take charge of this character, and let the character around him be fascinated by his beauty and femininity and paint the contrast with his inner self and conflict..

>>25186201
No not in that way. Don't do this to me. I already doubt myself. I suck at explaining, most of the story isn't going to have him in that position, most of the story is going to have him play and fail to play soldier and have him be an interpreter for this foreign and deranged world. Each place has its own ridiculous quirk, this is just his place.

My idea was that his place is founded by hippie types thats where the idea stems from. Give them 800 years and see what happens.
>>25186209
I see your point but that's actually supposed to be another character. This one is supposed to yearn for war.

I might not be getting what youre saying? focus more on others percieving him? as in he is cognizant of people staring, being "treated as a woman"?

>>25186191
I supposed I should have said "That's LitRPG?" As that there was my first exposure to the genre outside hearing the word.

How much of an evil degenerate scumbag can you possibly make a protagonist and get away with it? What are some examples that make it work?

>>25186575
make him HIGHLY competent

>>25185736
This is the only excerpt posted here recently that I've managed to read in full.
Overall, it reads very smoothly. Paragraph length is ideal for me. Your imagery is reserved yet evocative. You're doing something good here. It's hard to critique, really. The prose is good, and it lands emotionally.
>[...] to me. To me.
Loved this.
I've commented on fragments from this before. Have you made progress beyond this or have you just been revising?

>>25186612
This was meant for
>>25185728

>>25186612
>>25186615
kek just delete the post and resend, dont break that poor anons heart like that

>>25186612
Hey anon, thanks so much. Yes, it is finished. The whole thing needs a couple revisions, and after I trim some fat I think it will be about 14k words.

Thinking of adapting Symposium

>>25186696
For me, it's the Ring Cycle. But I can't seem to figure out the style I want to tell it.

>>25186847
You'll never surpass Ring: The Legend of the Nibelungen

>>25186936
I can try.

File: 1758943152191945.jpg (40.2 KB)

40.2 KB JPG

>>25185728
>in the goblin pits
>>25186612
ironically the passage you accidentally replied to is leaps better than 'globlin pit'

>>25187481
You've probably never even heard of it so you don't know I'm being sarcastic. You will probably surpass that game.

>>25187481
post your first page and we'll let you know if you're wasting your time or not

File: 1764030769508436.jpg (40.4 KB)

40.4 KB JPG

>>25187490
>write some schizobabble
>"AHEM! This is LEAPS better than childish genreslop"

>Socrates: all good poets, epic as well as lyric, compose their beautiful poems not by art, but because they are inspired and possessed.
>the poet is a light and winged and holy thing, and there is no invention in him until he has been inspired and is out of his senses, and the mind is no longer in him
Chat is this true?

>>25186575
William S Burroughs' protags mainline heroin then rape and kill children and its semi-autobiographical and you know what I love the guy

Bro death goes so fucking peaceful when there’s not a bitch in your ear crying its unnatural

‘I cant believe my own son-in-law has been using our christmas gift as a cum rag!’ - just wait until you hear what ive been doing with your daughter

>>25187800
Sort of. Developing a strong artistic intuition is vital. You can't actually think ahead about every single word you write. You study and read and absorb to let your mind marinate in high art so that it can produce an echo of it.

>>25187686
Do you only think it’s schizobabble because it went over your head?

>>25188123
>look at me, I'm deep and meaningful!

>>25188126
Dude thinks he's the first one to say men toil in vain under the sun.

>>25188114
more like autistic intuition amirite

What would you guys do if a friend sent you a copy of a book they digitally published and it was just ai slop that sounds nothing like they've ever written before?

>>25188182
call him out on it

>>25188182
Admonish them and tell them it is worse than what they're capable of. Unless they aren't then I'm just sorry.

When I started reading it, it was just so strange...I thought maybe it was just the introduction, but then every chapter I flipped through was basically identical in pacing, tone, and style. I've known this person for years and I never would've guessed they wrote this. I tossed a chapter into some ai detection tools and they generally agreed it was ai, some said 100% certain, but grok went back and forth between being 95% sure it was ai and 80% sure it was a human with maybe some light ai polish. This person is generally smarter than me in most ways that people would say matters, and certainly more accomplished, but I can't shake the feeling that it's almost entirely ai created. I have some theories on why they did it and why they may just see AI as a writing aid, but if that's the case, it makes me reevaluate a lot of other things in the past.

I finished writing my book and editing it the best I could. WHat do I do with it now?

>>25188369
Get over your fear of communicating publicly

>>25188262
just ask if she used AI

Victoria published yet?

>>25188524
Alright, I asked them how long it took to write and whether AI was involved, and they said it wasn't ai, but rather an assortment of thoughts they had, which someone else encouraged them to clean up and publish. To me the "clean up" part is maybe a soft admission that ai was used, and if that's all it was, I'd have no problem with it. What bothers me is the chapters are so smoothed over that I think each one could've been a one or two sentence prompt, and the whole book slapped together in an hour or two.

>>25188262
These AI detectors are bullshit.

>>25188550
You know AI didnt invent the clerical tone, right?

>>25188555
It's extremely repetitive meditative drivel...

Some mornings,
the light arrives before you do.
It slips through the curtain,
soft and unannounced.
You lie there,
And something inside you
pauses.
Not because the day demands it.
But because, for once,
you do not rush to fill the silence.
Breath moves.
Slow.
Unhurried.
It knows the body better than thought does.
There is a moment—
brief, almost shy—
when the mind rests.
No story yet.
No list.
No future leaning in.
Only this.
The weight of the blanket.
The faint hum of the world outside.
The gentle rise and fall
that has carried you
through every hidden night.
Later,
when the hours begin their steady pull,
notice how the small things
ask for your attention.
A cup of tea,
steam curling like a question.
The way your hand rests on the table,
quietly holding space.
The pause between one task
and the next.
These are not interruptions.
They are simply here.
Inside,
there is a room
you already know.
It has no walls of ambition.
No floor of comparison.
Only a single window
that opens onto what is.
Sit there sometimes.
Even for a minute.
Let the light fall across the floorboards
of your attention.
Nothing needs to happen.
The room does not ask for anything.
It only offers
presence.

Like, wtf, it just goes on and on, saying nothing. The more I think about it, the more it bothers me.

>>25188605
It is so bad I can believe a person actually wrote this.

>>25188608
It goes on for almost 200 pages and has almost no direction outside of the chapter titles. It also sounds absolutely like nothing he has ever written, at least not that I've seen.

>>25188615
I don't know but you piss me off

>>25188624
We can do an old timey boxing match if you're in the buffalo area. Afterwards we'll go out for root beer floats.

>>25188547
What is this Victoria story anons keep mentioning? Let me in on the joke

>>25188693
It's not a joke, it's a really good excerpt one anon shared some time ago.

>>25188699
so is it done? He probably just dropped it half way like everyone else

File: scr.png (428.9 KB)

428.9 KB PNG

Hi /wg/! I've had a romance short story (set in a near future sci-fi setting I've worked on for fun for the last year, but that's not particularly relevant to this) stuck in my head for a while that is forcing me to write it. This is the first time I've ever written a lot of dialogue, let alone romance, so I would appreciate any feedback. There are several things I don't like about it so far but I have a hard time separating objective issues from my own neuroticism (which, if past patterns hold, will eventually make me delete the whole thing). Any feedback is very welcome, particularly anything blunt and any advice on writing dialogue.

If it isn't obvious the viewpoint alternates between the man and the woman, I feel like each viewpoint is kind of short, even though this probably won't be more than 10 pages at most when it's finished.

Thanks!

>>25188262
AI detectors are very inaccurate, but that does sound weird

>>25188942
>heteroslop

>>25189019
nah don't worry, the girl is bisexual

File: images (40) (3).jpg (35.8 KB)

35.8 KB JPG

>>25189050

>>25189019
I am forever grateful that I am a bichad and do not feel the need to lose my shit over the existence of heterosexuals in fiction

>>25189050
>>25189062
>gender binary slop